


across the universe

by jjokkiri



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Youtuber AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-19
Updated: 2017-09-19
Packaged: 2018-12-31 16:03:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12136026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jjokkiri/pseuds/jjokkiri
Summary: It didn’t matter what path the stars might have drawn for them, before the universe began, because no matter where they went, as long as they were together, Kihyun swore that this wasright.





	across the universe

**Author's Note:**

> For Vanessa; who has supported my writing and been a kind friend for the past year. I think I'm late, in your timezone, but I promised that I'd write you something for your birthday, so here's the result of that promise. Happy birthday, I love you more than anything! 
> 
> And to everyone else: I hope you enjoy this work as much as I enjoyed writing it.

“Can I hold the camera?” _That meant that he was doing something that he wasn’t supposed to be doing._

Shin Hoseok looked over to his boyfriend, finally tearing his eyes away from the camera and pursing his lips. He shook his head with a grin, slightly longer legs taking quicker strides away from the love of his life. Yoo Kihyun, his boyfriend of five years, chased after him—and even with filming equipment strapped to the both of them, Kihyun still ran a lot faster than he anticipated. Bursting into laughter, Hoseok turned the camera off, holding it to his side as he broke into a sprint down the open streets of early morning Paris.

“Hoseok!” Kihyun yelled after him, and there’s the echo of this adorable whine in his tone.

And perhaps, it would have looked a little strange for them to be running after one another in the early morning of a foreign city, but this was how they worked. Early mornings in foreign cities, traveling together without a single idea of the next time they’d step back onto the ground of their homeland. Leaving South Korea seemed so far ago, but it’d only been a year and a half ago. It had only been a year and a half ago since they’d traded their normal daily lives, semi-frequent video blogging and stable jobs for a life of traveling and constant video blogging, with nothing but their loyal subscribers and one another with them.

Kihyun’s weight was all-too-familiar when he grabbed him and wrapped his arms around him, finally catching up to Hoseok and keeping him still. Soft laughter left the older man’s lips and he turned his body to face Kihyun, letting the camera hang to his side as he gently cupped Kihyun’s cheeks with a small smile on his lips. His eyes twinkled with amusement and he arched an eyebrow at his boyfriend.

“Yes?” he responded, cheekily, knocking their foreheads together gently. “What did I do?”

“You know exactly what you did,” Kihyun told him, lips tugging into a frown. Innocently, Hoseok shrugged and shook his head.

“I’m afraid I have no idea,” he said, and Kihyun smacked his arm.

They were both certain that Hoseok knew exactly what he did wrong. He had this terrible habit of turning the camera to film Kihyun instead of their surroundings. Kihyun always complained when they sat down together and Kihyun watched Hoseok edit their videos, because Hoseok’s camera never had enough footage of the cities they visited—it would end up being a log of Kihyun’s appearance throughout the day; sometimes running after Hoseok and breathing heavily, sometimes walking beside him and talking about what they _should_ be filming. When they had more time on their hands, they’d both carry around a camera and film their surroundings—Kihyun was better at focusing on the cityscapes; Hoseok liked to focus his camera on Kihyun.

“They wanted a vlog of our trip to the airport,” Kihyun said, “Not _another_ vlog of me.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t mind seeing another eight minute video of someone as beautiful as you, love,” he answered, not missing a beat. Kihyun rolled his eyes at the remark. Hoseok shrugged, turning to continue walking down the street, his hand dropping to link with Kihyun’s slender fingers. His tone was teasing when he spoke up, again, nudging Kihyun’s side with a sleazy grin on his lips. “But, come on, our vlogs are everything in our perspective, and I only have eyes for you.”

“If I had a dollar for every single time you said that,” Kihyun remarked, “I’d be able to afford a month-long trip to Musha Cay, plane ticket, entire island and everything, three times, without the help of any of the advertising revenue.”

The remark drew an immediate laugh from Hoseok’s lips; loud and amused. Then, batting his lashes playfully, Hoseok nudged Kihyun’s side with a cheeky smile on his lips, “My ticket too, right?”

“No, just me.”

He stopped walking, pouting at the younger man as if trying to prove some kind of point (“I know you couldn’t bear to leave me behind for an entire month!”), and Kihyun smacked his arm again, but then he was linking his arm with Hoseok. And one of his favourite things about his favourite person in the entire world was the soft spot that he had for him—the soft spot Kihyun had in his heart for him.

“We can film the walk to the airport, next time.”

 

 

 

 _[_ _기호 TV_ _\- Q &A] You Asked For It. Uploaded 3 minutes ago; August 23, 2017._ The hotel room was empty and an unmade bed was seen in the frame of the camera; the lights were off and the only source of light was the sunshine streaming into the room from the open window behind where the camera was set up. And then, suddenly, Hoseok popped into the frame, grinning at the camera.

 _“Boo!”_ he said, and Kihyun popped up shortly after him, throwing himself back onto the bed and groaning.

 _“We were supposed to do it together!”_ And then there was a static sound as the clip replayed, this time, the both of them managing to time their attempt at scaring the camera properly. Then, the video blacked out, text appearing on the screen in plain font reading: w _e’re finally doing that Q &A video that you guys wanted so badly._

The sound of a rewinding tape played, and then Kihyun and Hoseok appeared on the screen again, both of them sitting on chairs at a desk where the camera was set up. Kihyun sat to Hoseok’s left and they were both facing the camera; Hoseok was holding cue cards and grinning to himself—their location flashed in the corner of the screen with the time and date: _Auckland, New Zealand; August 17, 2017._

“The last Q&A video we did was in 2015,” Kihyun remarked, “That’s two years ago and you guys wanted an updated version, so badly that thousands of you commented on every single video we posted about it.”

The screen filled itself with pop-ups of the comment screen-shots asking for the video.

“So, we’re doing it,” Hoseok added, chuckling. He waved the cue cards in his hands—the back of the cards had their logo scribed on it. “We’ll start right away with one of the questions that you guys seem to ask a lot.”

Kihyun pulled the cue card from Hoseok’s stack and read out the words as they appeared subtitled on the screen, _“How do you guys really feel about traveling so much? You never have a definite home to return to, doesn’t that make you feel homesick?”_

Hoseok immediately grinned, interrupting the younger man almost immediately after he finished reading the question aloud.

“We’re doing what we love with each other and that’s traveling the world, making content for you guys to see. I never really think about if I miss home or not, because I’m always traveling with Kihyunnie by my side, and you know how they say _‘home is where the heart is’_? I don’t think I ever feel homesick because I’m traveling the world with my home; _Kihyun’s my home._ ”

The older man rested his chin in his palm, smiling innocently at the camera. Kihyun’s cheeks coloured a light pink and there was a silence in the video; Hoseok sitting peacefully and Kihyun unsure of what he was supposed to do or say. The edited image of the video flashed between Kihyun’s blank (but flustered) expression, and Hoseok’s pleased smile, before it fixed itself on the both of them.

The camera zoomed into Kihyun’s flustered face, text appearing around his face with various remarks stating how adorable he was. And then, suddenly, it zoomed back out and Kihyun shoved the older man and Hoseok fell out of his seat, laughing loudly. The video frame flickered and then, Kihyun was the only one sitting at the desk, smiling innocently at the camera.

“Anyway, now that’s _he’s_ gone: next question!”

(In small letters next to Kihyun’s face, the edited text read: _look, he’s still blushing! ^w^_ )

 

 

 

“When did you film this?” Kihyun asked, frowning at the screen of his laptop. He dragged the seeker back to where he saw a clip of himself, standing in front of a railing and looking down at the waterfall. It was edited with soft music playing in the background, a soft filter re-colouring the video clip and making it look dreamy.

They were leaning against one another, curled up in the hotel bed in Tokyo. Hoseok was editing another video to upload, while Kihyun was reviewing their more recently uploaded videos. At the sound of his boyfriend’s voice interrupting his focus in cutting the video clips and timing them, Hoseok removed his glasses, peering over at Kihyun’s screen.

“That?” he pursed his lips, brows furrowing. “That was when we were in Canada. That’s just in front of Niagara Falls, don’t you recognize it? We were just there three weeks ago.”

“No,” Kihyun replied, “I know where it is. I just didn’t remember you holding a camera while we were there, much less filming me.”

Hoseok chuckled, shaking his head and putting his glasses back on to turn back to editing the video, “You’re adorable when you get absorbed in our surroundings, so I need to film it and keep it forever, love.”

“You’re so disgusting,” Kihyun told him. Hoseok hooked an arm around his boyfriend without sparing him another glance, chuckling quietly to himself again at the tone of the younger man’s voice.

“But, you love me.”

 

 

 

 _[_ _기호_ _EAT] Tokyo (Again). Uploaded 7 minutes ago; January 2, 2017._ Night rose with the flashing city lights of Tokyo, a drone shot filming panning upwards on the cityscape, until it reached a point in the night sky where the lights couldn’t be seen anymore, then, small neat white letters faded onto the screen: _170102, Tokyo (Street-food Edition)._

The screen flashed and then Kihyun and Hoseok were both walking side by side, in the middle of a busy street in the middle of the night.

“Oh, that looks so good,” Hoseok said, the camera easily staying stable even with the excited shake of his hand when he pointed to a dimly lit stall on the street. The streets were lined with street-food stalls and people filled the walkway, all of them dressed up and headed towards the shrine for the New Year Celebrations.

“Do you want some?” Kihyun asked, glancing at Hoseok and fishing out his wallet, searching through it for some coins. Grinning, Hoseok nodded and they made their way through the crowd of people to get to the stall; Kihyun almost being hit in the head with someone’s lantern and Hoseok pulling him a little closer to protect him from harm.

The screen quickly transitioned into a shot of Hoseok holding the camera to Kihyun, likely walking backwards as he filmed his speaking boyfriend. They had their food in their hands—a paper plate with a few fried buns on them. They were a distance away from where the stall was; footage had been edited out of the clip to keep it shorter.

“The food is so hot,” Kihyun gasped, fanning his open mouth and trying to wave the steam away with a desperate hand. Off-camera, the muted sound of Hoseok’s laughter could be heard as he watched his boyfriend suffer. The younger man’s eyes seemingly teared up as he bounced with every step he took, trying his best to control the effect of the heat.

“It can’t be that bad,” Hoseok’s voice came from behind the camera, and Kihyun finally swallowed, glaring at him. Stabbing the ball in his paper plate with the skewer, Kihyun held it up to the camera, before pushing it past the camera’s view and feeding Hoseok.

“Eat it all in one bite,” Kihyun demanded.

They had to censor the profanity that left Hoseok’s lips when he obeyed the order.

 

 

 

It’s only _absolutely terrifying_ to Kihyun, when he was standing at the gate to board the plane without his boyfriend in sight. They were in Atlanta and waiting for their plane to head to Paris, when Kihyun looked anxiously at his watch and counted the minute he’d been away from his boyfriend. A total of thirty minutes had passed since Hoseok told him that he’d be headed to the washroom; a total of thirty minutes since Kihyun told him that he’d meet him at the gate, because it would take too long to check in later, if he were to wait for him.

Unfortunately, splitting up was a bad idea, because Hoseok hadn’t taken his battery pack with him and Kihyun wasn’t able to contact his phone—they hardly had signal in the airport. He couldn’t know if his boyfriend’s phone was dead (or if he was, simply because his mind had an obsession with thinking of the absolute worst). So, worried sick, Kihyun wandered the airport with the help of a security guard in hopes of finding his (terribly foolish) boyfriend. The Atlanta Airport was stressful and too busy, so with the clock ticking down to their departure time and the attendants not being able to properly pronounce Hoseok’s name on the loudspeaker and successfully find him, Kihyun was _freaking out_. Missing their flight wouldn’t be too much of a problem, because they’d be able to reschedule it to a later hour, but his missing boyfriend was a _huge_ problem.

An obviously panicked Kihyun following closely behind a security guard, trying his best to stay updated with the location of his boyfriend. He wrung his hands together as he walked behind the security guard, nervously darting his eyes around the busy airport in hopes of finding familiarity. And perhaps, it might have been a better idea to stay at the gate and ask for someone to find Hoseok and bring him there. Unfortunately, it was unsettling in Kihyun’s mind to leave the task of finding his boyfriend to strangers, despite how helpful.

Finally finding Hoseok was like finding water in a desert after years of being stranded. The older man was standing with another security guard who was radioing to the guard that was standing with Kihyun and giving vague instructions to their location. Kihyun saw Hoseok before the guard standing with him did, because in a desperate state, in a sea of people, all he could see was the love of his life; a beacon of light, a ray of sweet familiarity, among an ocean of strangers.

The guard was surprised when Kihyun broke into a sprint away from him. But, when he turned his head, Kihyun had left his carry-on bags behind and was already throwing himself onto his boyfriend, arms wrapping tightly around him and burying his face into the older man’s neck.

“Oh my god, Hoseok! Do you know how terrified I was?” Kihyun exclaimed, on the verge of tears. His voice nearly cracked, both from the volume and the threat of tears. People turned to look at him, but looking at Hoseok in that moment rendered him ignorant to their surroundings—all he could care about what Hoseok; all he could see was Hoseok. “I thought I actually would never find you again! You’re so stupid!”

“I’m sorry,” Hoseok said, after a moment of silence. Hoseok’s strong arms wrapped around Kihyun’s waist and he leaned forward to press a kiss to his forehead—no whispers of _‘I was looking for you’_ because they both knew it wasn’t needed; Kihyun already knew. And what was important was that they were with one another again.

(And Kihyun made excuses to not let go of Hoseok’s hand for the rest of the trip to Paris.)

 

 

 _[_ _기호_ _PLUS –_ _호_ _TV] Found in Paris. Uploaded 5 minutes ago; February 14, 2017._ The camera-work was slightly shaky when Hoseok held up his hand-held camera and there was a quiet laugh that echoed into the microphone, before there was a static sound and Hoseok was grinning at the camera. The sunlight was bright and Hoseok was walking against the light; a baseball cap on his head, covering his dark locks of hair, was keeping his eyes from being glared at in the sun.

“Short update: we just landed in Paris and I’m lost,” he declared to the camera with a cheeky smile. “We just landed in Paris this morning, and Kihyun’s still asleep. I wanted to go out and explore a little without him. Unfortunately, I have no idea where I am.”

He looked behind himself and pointed to the shop with a frown on his lips, “I couldn’t find anyone to help me back to the hotel, my French clearly isn’t good enough to be walking around the city without the master of body language, you know? I was wandering around the city, since I can’t find my way back—I think I’ll find my way back eventually, if I keep walking.”

The camera shifted and Hoseok was walking down the street again, the camera showing the view of the street in front of him as he walked. “This is the way I came from, I think. That store looks familiar, so I think I’m right.” A sigh could be heard from behind the camera, followed by a sudden excited gasp, “Oh! I wanted to buy him something from that shop over there, since it’s almost Valentine’s Day and all.”

He turned his camera towards a small shop at the corner of the street. “But, when I left the hotel, I forgot that Kihyun keeps all of the money and I only grabbed enough for bus fare. I think maybe we’ll just spend the rest of the week in Paris, so we can just explore the city on Valentine’s Day, together—walk around the City of Love together… _that’s Paris, right?”_

He chuckled, shaking his head and turning the camera back to himself, “Anyway, I don’t know when he’ll wake up, so I think that I should try my best to be headed back to the hotel soon, so he doesn’t blow my phone up and ask me where I am.”

Hoseok turned around and headed down the street, not clear of where he was headed, but he continued to walk with his lips pursed slightly in curiosity. “I think I’ll turn this off, now. I’ll see you guys later when I’m back with Kihyun!”

 

 

 

“All your photos always turn out so nice, I don’t get it,” Hoseok remarked, resting his cheek in his hand and leaning his elbow against the table. They were sitting in the middle of a café, filming equipment packed out onto the small table in front of them, lattes placed dangerously close to the expensive equipment. Kihyun was leaned back in his seat and Hoseok was bent over the table, looking through the photos saved into the memory card of Kihyun’s camera.

“It’s practiced perfection,” Kihyun told him, a small smile on his lips, though he tried to not make his satisfaction so obvious at the compliment. The older man flipped through the shots and he frowned at one of the shots, tilting the camera.

“Except for this one,” Hoseok told him. Kihyun looked up in surprise, his brows furrowing slightly, and Hoseok unstrapped his own camera from around his neck and turned the device on, quickly flipping through the gallery of images to search for the almost-identical shot he took. “This is the only photo I’ve seen you take that isn’t as nice as mine.”

Kihyun frowned, reaching his hand out to motion for Hoseok to hand him the camera for inspection. Cheekily, Hoseok turned his camera around and he showed the digital display to his boyfriend, lashes fluttering with childish amusement. Leaning forward with his elbows on the table, Kihyun narrowed his eyes at the image, eyes darting to where his camera was rested on the table.

“What do you mean this isn’t as good as yours?”

“We took a shot of similar things, but mine looks more breathtaking,” Hoseok remarked, nodding firmly. Kihyun studied him with a frown on his lips. There was hardly a difference in the shots—Kihyun’s shot was a landscape of the canyon, every highlight and shadow seemingly bursting with colour and detail without the help of post-production effects. Hoseok’s shot was taken with a wider lens and the image seemed to lack focus on the canyon, leading lines pulling themselves towards the silhouette of a figure holding up his camera; _Kihyun_.

“We literally took a photo of the same thing, Hoseok,” Kihyun argued, disbelief clouding his expression. Hoseok grinned, leaning back in his seat and stretching out his arms to study the image on the screen of his DSLR.

“No,” Hoseok said, simply. “You took a photo of the canyon. I took a photo of _you_.”

 

 

 

 _[@kiho_tv] Instagram Live: 22:07 CEST. Started 0 minutes ago; February 25, 2017._ The streetlights were bright enough for the stream to cast light upon both Kihyun and Hoseok’s faces. They peered into the camera with curious expressions, and then Hoseok’s eyes lit up when the viewer count began to rise with the start of their live stream.

“Hi guys,” Hoseok greeted with Kihyun hanging over his shoulder and looking down at the comments. The younger man was reading the inflow of comments; eyes quickly scanning through the inquiries. A majority of them asked for their location. “We’re in Berlin, right now.”

“But, we’re lost,” Kihyun chuckled, brows furrowing as he followed the comments with his eyes. “Thankfully, we’re lost together, this time. Really, we could just get a GPS navigation going on, but we decided to drop in and see how you guys were doing, instead. Maybe, you can tell us to go in a certain direction, and we’ll keep going? See where that takes us?”

Suddenly, Hoseok started laughing, “Someone commented that we’d just get lost and freak out again,” he said. “We didn’t write the blog post for you guys to attack us like this!”

Kihyun rolled his eyes, draping his arm around the older man’s shoulders and smiling, eyes twinkling with love even in the dim light, “No, it’s okay if we get lost, now. We’re fine with getting lost, as long as we’re with each other. Right, babe?”

Hoseok grinned.

“Of course, sugar plum.”

 

 

 

The only time they ever managed to rest was when they were on the plane, flying from city to city. Sometimes, Hoseok wouldn’t have any of his editing work to do and they’d manage to catch a little bit of rest. It was Kihyun’s favourite part of their travelling experiences; the moments where they could relax without anything to do. They loved their subscribers and supporters with everything they had, because they were the people who made their dreams come true, but there was something absolutely amazing about the moments where they didn’t need to document their lives on video and could just spend their time looking into one another’s eyes; or falling asleep, hand in hand.

Now, laying down in the reclining chairs and flying first class, Kihyun’s fingers were intertwined with Hoseok’s—gently, but enough to reassure him that he was there, right by his side and so in love with him. Their love radiated in the subtle things they did, and it was Kihyun’s favourite part. If their love was a movie, then perhaps, this was the part that Kihyun would never grow tired of watching, over and over.

Everything that seemed so insignificant always carried itself with so much meaning for the both of them—they’d been together for so long that they shared their lives and just understood one another so well. Their love never needed to be spoken aloud, but whenever they said it, their hearts would still flutter childishly, like it was the first time, all over again.

Hoseok was sound asleep, softly snoring beside Kihyun, and the younger man watched the way Hoseok’s long lashes fanned a light shadow across his cheeks; watched as Hoseok’s lips curled into a small smile, likely the result of a good dream—or if Kihyun were to submit to the sappy ideas of his heart, then maybe, he’d hope that Hoseok was smiling for the sole reason that he fell asleep next to the younger man.

Slender fingers ran through Hoseok’s hair, gently as to not wake him up, and then he was smiling to himself—fondness glowing in his eyes, before he let them flutter shut and he leaned back in his own seat.

“I love you,” he whispered, words directed to Hoseok, but his eyes never opening again. “You mean the world to me, and I hope you know it.”

And if it was a coincidence, then it was perfect, because the small smile on Hoseok’s lips grew slightly and his fingers subconsciously tightened around Kihyun’s smaller fingers.

They had a long flight ahead of them and hours of bliss to spend in their own little world, together.

 

 

 

 _[_ _기호_ _TV] Adventures in Nevada. Uploaded 2 minutes ago; April 7, 2017._ The camera focused onto Kihyun and Hoseok sitting on a bed in a hotel room. It was dimly lit and there was a candle behind them. Kihyun was reading through a book while Hoseok adjusted the camera, and the location flashed across the screen in white letters, fading out quickly: _170404, Las Vegas, Nevada._

“It’s been a while since we’ve done a life update video,” Kihyun remarked, closing the book and putting it aside. “We’re doing on now, because we don’t think we can do anything exciting for a short while. But, we don’t really want to leave the channel lacking updates while I’m healing.”

“We were at Red Rock Canyon, and Kihyunnie got hurt rock climbing,” Hoseok told the camera, frowning. “He’s lucky it wasn’t too bad, because the fall wasn’t terrible but we still had to take him to a hospital. We actually just got discharged from the hospital, yesterday. I think Kihyunnie posted a photo of his cast on Instagram, right? But I think we can’t really do anything super fun until his leg heals.”

Leaning against his boyfriend, Kihyun frowned, shrugging. Hoseok immediately draped his arm around the younger man, the action smooth and comfortable, as if he didn’t need to think about it at all, before he committed to it.

“I got too excited,” he admitted, smiling sheepishly at the camera. “Be careful when you go rock climbing, guys. Safety is the most important part! But, when you’re sure that you’re safe, I really do recommend coming here to climb, if you’re into that. It’s really amazing, here.”

“We’d also like to thank all of you who left Kihyun _‘get well soon’_ messages on his Instagram post,” Hoseok said. “That’s very sweet of you guys, and I really hope he gets better soon, too. It makes me sad to see my baby hurt.”

Kihyun swatted at him, but the flush on his cheeks showed that he appreciated the care.

 

 

 

Manila was a _disaster_.

An old friend of Hoseok, from when he was still majoring in music production at a university in Seoul, happened to be in the city at the same time that they landed in the city. Lee Minhyuk was more than ecstatic to reconnect with a friend from university, because they’d gone on to do different things with their lives, despite once majoring in the same program, at the same university. Their friendship dated back to before the days when Hoseok was first getting to know Kihyun.

He really shouldn’t have been jealous, because he knew that they were friends and Hoseok was _so_ loyal to him. But, Hoseok was too nice and Minhyuk was too touchy. The morning started off well, when they went out for coffee to catch up with one another, but eventually, tagging along with the two of them started to feel a little bit awkward. Kihyun swore he was reading too deep into the situation, but he certainly was far from pleased when Minhyuk tagged along for the majority of the day.

They hardly managed to get any filming done, because Minhyuk didn’t want to be filmed, but he wanted to spend the day with Hoseok. The red-haired producer easily got onto Kihyun’s nerves, and Hoseok was too nice to tell him that they had to film videos for their subscribers, because they hadn’t uploaded content in a while. Kihyun would have spoken up, but there was a reasoning in the back of his head that told him snapping at Hoseok’s friend would potentially upset him.

Unfortunately, staying silent was a sure-fire way to upset Kihyun.

Hoseok had warned him ahead of time that Minhyuk was an affectionate person: loud and touchy, and Kihyun had smiled at him and told him that it was okay for them to hang out, because they hadn’t seen one another in forever. Kihyun definitely wasn’t the type of person to forbid his significant other from meeting up with certain people, just because he was jealous—he liked to think of himself as reasonable—but at the same time, Yoo Kihyun wasn’t the type of person to get jealous so easily, either.

“I’m heading back to the hotel, Hoseok,” Kihyun said, after hours of trailing behind Hoseok and Minhyuk, who were excitedly talking about something in music. Kihyun had been a chemistry major, before he dropped out of school, and he hadn’t the slightest clue about what they were talking about. To say that he felt left out might have been a little bit of an understatement.

Hoseok turned his head, frowning slightly, “So soon, babe?”

Minhyuk nodded, “Yeah, don’t you want to stay for lunch?”

Kihyun shook his head, lips tugging into a forced smile, “No thanks. I feel jet-lagged from the flight, so I think I’ll head back and go to sleep for a bit,” he said. “I’ll be fine. _You two enjoy yourselves_.”

And he pretended it didn’t hurt when Hoseok simply nodded, instead of following him.

(Hoseok was supposed to know him better than that.)

 

 

 

 _[_ _기호_ _PLUS –_ _기_ _TV_ _] He Hurt Me. Uploaded 48 minutes ago; August 17, 2017._ The editing style was significantly different from what it usually was, almost obviously like Hoseok didn’t have a hand in editing the video at all—he was usually the main editor for their videos, and Kihyun was the one who didn’t have a hand in editing the videos. Perhaps, it was a little bit too petty of a move (the whole _‘making an important decision without consulting Hoseok’_ thing, at the very least), but the screen flickered several times, before Kihyun appeared on the screen alone—he didn’t tell Hoseok that he was uploading a new video, without him.

“I will be posting something on my Instagram, too,” he said. “But, I wanted to tell you guys, first. You’re probably thinking: _‘wow, we haven’t had a Kihyun TV video in forever!’_ , and then the title is like this. It’s kind of a surprise, isn’t it?”

Kihyun turned his head to look out the window of the hotel room. He kept glancing at the door, almost as if he was expecting someone to walk in, but it never happened. So, sighing softly, the young man glanced back to the camera.

“… after years of making videos together,” Kihyun told the camera with a sad smile on his lips, “I think that we should have a break from one another, so we’re going to put this channel on a hiatus for a while. I’m sorry to those of you who were really looking forward to our series. I’ll still be travelling, and I’ll keep you updated through social media, so I’ll see you all there.”

_[A new comment on your video: @Shin Hoseok: babe, what the hell?]_

 

 

 

_Error: Username or password is incorrect. Please check your credentials._

The flood of message requests to his direct messages and the comments under his posts on Instagram asking him what happened between himself and Kihyun was his first hint to Kihyun being mad at him. He hadn’t gotten the notification for the video, but a subscriber had directed him to their channel and he’d watched the video, shocked. Hoseok looked up at his boyfriend, who silently sat on his laptop across the room, confusion clouding his expression and he furrowed his brows at Kihyun. Kihyun had been silent for hours and hadn’t even greeted him when he came back to the hotel room from spending the entire day with Minhyuk.

“Kihyun, did you change the password of our channel?” Hoseok asked. “Our subscribers are freaking out at me and blowing up my phone. And what is that video? Why didn’t you tell me, if you were going to call it quits on our channel?”

Kihyun ignored him, continuing to work on his laptop without saying a single word to the older man. Irritation ticked at Hoseok’s mind, but his more rational mindset immediately pondered what he’d done to have the younger man so upset to the point that he wouldn’t want to talk to him at all. Closing his laptop and sighing, Hoseok ran his fingers through his hair and frowned at the younger man.

“You know that ignoring me won’t solve anything, right?” he said, furrowing his brows at the younger man. “We always said that we’d always work everything out. Why are you being like this? I can’t make anything better, if you won’t tell me what I did wrong.”

“Is that so?”

Eyes flickering up to where they met with Hoseok’s, Kihyun clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth, _annoyed_. He was the one being dramatic, but it didn’t stop him from being annoyed at Hoseok’s words, either.

“Well, I’m not calling it quits forever. We’ll go back to it, when I think that I can do this with you again—I know he’s your friend, but you seemed too willing to give up all our plans for him. So, I’m sure they’ll understand, but you know, it couldn’t have been too hard to check up on me,” Kihyun told him, packing up his stuff and heading to the hotel room’s entrance and then shutting the door behind him.

And that was the last thing that Kihyun told him, before he was given the cold shoulder treatment for the next few days.

 

 

 

 _[@shinhoseok_tv] Instagram Live: 02:37 AEST. Started 0 minutes ago; August 18, 2017._ Hoseok’s camera was set up on his desk and he was writing something on a sheet of paper, his lips pursed slightly in concentration. It seemed almost as if he was too focused to talk to the camera, but then he was glancing up at the screen, pen slipping between his frowning lips.

“Kihyun’s mad at me,” he said, in response to the flooding comments. “I’m writing him a song as an apology. I’ve been thinking about what I did wrong, and I think I’ve kind of worked it out. I’m not really sure, but he won’t talk to me, so the least I can do is try to show him that I love him.”

The comment panel flooded itself with words of encouragement and comments of cooing adoration at his words. Hoseok managed to let his lips tug into a slight smile at the response from his fans.

“I’m doing my best,” he said, after a moment. “It’s been a long time since I’ve written anything, because I haven’t tried to do anything, since I dropped out of school to start this channel with Kihyun, you know? He helped me make my dreams come true, but producing music was always a passion of mine—I don’t think there’s a better way to prove my love than to do it through my passions. If it’s not making videos, then it’s this.”

Hoseok was quiet, scribbling onto the sheet of paper, sometimes glancing up and answering some comments that flashed onto the screen.

“What time is it? It’s almost 3 in the morning, here, but Kihyunnie hasn’t come back to the hotel and he won’t pick up any of my calls. I can only hope that he’s going to be okay. But, he’s going to be fine, I think… my baby is strong.”

He glanced at the clock, and then the cup of coffee to his side.

“Me, on the other hand, I’ll keep writing until I fall asleep.”

 

 

 

Getting Kihyun alone and willing to listen to him was the hardest part of working towards apologizing to him, once he finally figured everything out. The younger man had gone as far as asking for another bed in the hotel room, because he didn’t want to sleep in the same bed as someone who he was angry with. It broke Hoseok’s heart, because Kihyun made an effort to not be in the room with Hoseok, if there wasn’t anything to accompany him. But, it’d given him the time to ponder his mistakes and finish what he’d been planning for his apology.

Kihyun wasn’t pleased with having to sit down in front of Hoseok, when he wasn’t ready to let go of his petty irritation at the older man. Kihyun crossed his arms, when Hoseok sat down on the bed across from him with his guitar in his hands and the younger man arched his brow.

“I never thought I’d be using my guitar like this,” Hoseok told him, chuckling softly. Kihyun looked unimpressed, but he didn’t say anything more.

“I wrote you a song,” Hoseok said, after a moment. At that, Kihyun blinked, letting his expression slip into surprise.

“You wrote me a _song_?”

“As an apology,” Hoseok said. “Because I’m sorry that I was insensitive and that I didn’t realize that you were upset that I was spending so much time with Minhyuk and not paying attention to you. I’m sorry that we were so comfortable with one another that I didn’t notice the things I probably should have picked up on a lot easier. I know how much YouTube means to you, but do you realize how much you mean to me?

“I know that you were just acting out of jealousy,” Hoseok continued, “And don’t you dare to deny it. I know you, Kihyunnie. You’re not the type to irrationally make decisions unless it’s out of feelings you’re not used to feeling. I looked back on everything, and we both have our differences sometimes, but aside from that, I think we’re as perfect for one another as can be and I really don’t want to lose you.

“I’m sorry and I’ll try to be better, if you promise to work with me, baby,” he said. “Could you love me like that, again?”

Kihyun’s emotions were like a waterfall—water rushing towards and edge and then falling over in a beautiful cascade. He buried his face into Hoseok’s neck, before Hoseok could feel the tears on his neck and he wrapped his arms around him tightly. The younger man sniffled and nodded against him, tightening his grip around his boyfriend.

“I love you,” he whispered. “I’m sorry for being so dramatic. Forgive me.”

And it was like everything they’d ever said to one another finally aligned—a line drawn in red across the universe, connecting them together, simply because they were made for one another and there was nothing in the world that could change that.

 

 

 

 _[_ _기호_ _PLUS] Starting Something New. Uploaded 10 minutes ago; September 19, 2017._ There was something magical about the light that flickered against the camera lens when the familiar introduction clip to their vlogs played with the familiar music. Scripted letters drew themselves across the screen in white font: _170919, Brisbane, Australia._

“Hi, guys!” Kihyun’s voice was heard in the voiceover, when the camera panned over a drone shot of the reefs by the ocean. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it? We’ve missed you a lot, and we really hope that you missed us too.”

The screen panned over a river and then up the side of a cliff, and Hoseok’s voice took over the voiceover.

“This is our official return to YouTube, and if you’ve been following us on social media, then you know that we’ve been planning to upload this video for a while,” he said. “We have some exciting news to share with you guys.”

The camera moved towards the bright blue sky, before quickly transitioning into an orange glow of a sunset evening. Then, there was a clip of Hoseok and Kihyun walking in the city at night, their backs to the camera and the focus on the lens was on their intertwined fingers. The image was dark, save the orange glow from the setting sun.

Kihyun’s voice was heard, again, “We’ve been staying in Australia for a couple weeks, now. The very first thing we did when we got here was spend an entire day sleeping, because we didn’t have plans to leave, anytime soon.”

And then, Hoseok; “We actually came here the day after Kihyun posted that clip of me singing to him on his Instagram.”

“Hoseok said that he wanted to come back to Australia, because the last time we were here, it was for a meet and greet and we didn’t really get to do very much.” Kihyun said. ‘The big news, however, happened very recently.”

“It happened this morning, actually,” Hoseok said, chuckling. The screen flickered back to the cliff, except this time, there was a slight breeze and Kihyun could be seen leaning against a tree on the cliff. In slow motion, the wind brushed through Kihyun’s hair. “We went back to the cliffside; Kihyun made some snacks, because he wanted to have a romantic picnic.”

“I wanted to be romantic, and Hoseok laughed at me. But, he shouldn’t be allowed to say anything.”

“I told him to meet me at the cliffside,” Hoseok said.

“So, I went ahead and got everything set up ahead of time, because Hoseok insisted that he had a bunch of things to do and he couldn’t come with me,” Kihyun added. “Truthfully, I should have seen it coming, because it was so suspicious.”

“I surprised him,” Hoseok added.

“He came out of nowhere, really,” Kihyun said, sounding both amused and miffed. Hoseok finally appeared in the video, reaching for Kihyun’s hand, and the transition in the video zoomed into their hands; fingers intertwined and highlighting the matching silver bands around their fingers.

“I asked him to marry me.”

_“And I said yes.”_

**Author's Note:**

> as always, i can be found on twitter @yuseokki! ^^


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